Cowboy Derek and the Pumpkin Patch

A couple Sundays ago, I brought Derek into my room to play while I finished getting ready. He found Aunt Lanae's cowboy hat and paraded around, entirely too pleased with himself. He loves to play with Grandpa's baseball hat, so a cowboy hat was just another plaything to him. Don't worry, Lanae - we put it back safe and sound.



My Mom and Rick invited us to go to a pumpkin patch about an hour south of McKinney. After a bit of a rocky (and late) start, we met up with them and my Aunt, Uncle and a few of my cousins. My cousins are a few years older than Derek and were more excited about the bouncy houses and tractor rides, but Derek was easily entertained with massive pumpkins. Good thing for me, because I had some pictures I wanted to take. We all got together later that evening to carve pumpkins and watch the 4th game in the World Series. Go Rangers!

You know all those cutesy family pictures people take with props? This was my attempt.

Kind of worked, but he kept grabbing the blocks

Folding arms didn't work very well either. Oh well, he's cute!

He's such a little dude!

Jailbird!

My awesome cousins!

Family!

Mitch was so patient with Derek. Derek kept "asking" to ride the merry-go-round so Mitch squeezed his big frame into the itty bitty space. Twice. This is Derek's excited face. No happy squeals, just quiet. He's such a funny little boy!

Love this face! Looks like another Harry Potter spell moment to me.

Holding out his hand to show me his rocks

And of course, the Big Green (John Deere) Tractor!

Witch's Brew with Nana

Petting the "Puppy"

Like I mentioned, we went back to Uncle Tim and Aunt Jen's house to carve pumpkins and watch the Rangers battle the Cardinals in the World Series. It was fun to hang out with family and roast pumpkin seeds, eat Uncle Tim's pork (YUM!!) and Aunt Jen's cookies (YUM YUM!!) and play with little Jazzy (the Chug). Derek was surprisingly not afraid of Jazzy or Izzy (the boxer). Last time he'd seen dogs, he was not too excited to play. This time, Izzy licked his face, followed him around and pushed him over a couple times and he didn't seem to mind. At first though, he wanted to be in my lap. When Izzy left the immediate vicinity, he'd get down to wander, but when he made eye contact with Izzy (who would immediately start heading his way), Derek would drop everything and run to the nearest lap. Too funny. He stopped this after a bit, but it was funny while it lasted. My little boy is growing up! *sniff sniff*

Mom and Ally took hand carvers to this massive pumpkin.

Then Uncle Tim broke out the Dremel automatic carver. Short work of three pumpkins

Derek wasn't sure what to think of the pumpkin guts

He figured out what the scraper was for pretty quick though!